Adventures of Cameron & Emma in Buenos Aires

at least they had eachother

A few days after Russ’ arrival, we decided to check out the Zoo in Buenos Aires, which is conveniently located less than a mile from our house. The last time I had been to the Zoo was in the fourth grade, so I was excited to see some “wild” animals at such close range. What I didn’t expect is the expression of defeat and depression that each animal carried on their face. The thought of Zoo’s always kinda depressed me anyhow, all these animals locked up. I am aware thought, that it is more of a learning tool, to teach people about animals that they would never get to see otherwise…but, then again, there is the animal channel for a reason. The most depressing was the grizzly bear who looked absolutely INSANE. He was isolated in a small exhibit, and kept walking in circles shaking his head… stomping round and round, with a crazy glossy look on his face. I had to walk away. He was already lost. Unlike the Rhino who presumably was in an earlier stage of insanity, he (or she) looked as if he had completely given up on life, plopped down in the dirt, sad and alone. The most physically shocking of the animals was the camel… it looked as if it had some type of STD all over its body, chunks of hair just gone, scabby, really nasty.

Now… on a lighter note, some of the animals didn’t look like they completely gave up on life; there were nutrias who were able to roam freely, that was pretty uplifting. Some of the animals had many friends with them, and although enclosed in cement surroundings, (no effort was put into making their cages resemble the wild) at least they were all in it together.

One of the best parts about the zoo was watching the children light up with excitement at seeing these animals for the first time. Russ kept getting mad at me because I wanted to take pictures of them… I got one before he took his camera away. This little boy was the most excited to have his picture taken with a regular house pet. There was a cat walking around the zoo freely, flaunting his freedom, and this boy requested that his mother take a picture of him with the cat, seeing an opportunity, I snapped one as well. I liked his simplicity.